The Elohim

Elohim is a Hebrew word which literally translates to "Gods and Goddesses" or more simply "Deities". The term Elohim occurs in the more ancient versions the Old Testament. Recent interpretations, of which there are many, appear to have completely edited out the term, regarding it as archaic. Understanding the term and where it came from is a key element to understanding the Bible and more importantly the ancient sources from which the Bible was derived.

The word Elohim is dominant in the five Books of Moses, generally known as the Pentateuch or as the Elohist Tradition, in which 'Elohim' rather than 'Yahweh' was used to refer to the Creators. In Hebrew, the term 'El', stemming from the Akkadian word "Ilu", was a generic term for a God or Deity, and 'Elohim', being it's plural literally meant 'the gods'.

Every place you see the word 'God' in Genesis, replace it with the word Elohim, the original word used. In several cases when the leader of the Elohim is addressing the other 'Gods', it has been rendered in English as "the Lord God"; it should be read as "the Leader of the Gods".

The Elohim were also known by the Hebrews as the Anakim, which is a derivative form of the Sumerian word 'Anunnaki'. Anakim was used by the Hebrews exactly as the Sumerians used Anunnaki, when referring, collectively, to the race of Gods. 

When talking of a specific God the Hebrews used "El" normally in a context such as "El Shaddai", which means God of the mountainor any specific title. In Hebrew Elohim and Anakim are often confused, even by "experts" with the Nephilim. The Nephilim is the term employed to describe the children of a union between people of the race of Anakim and Humans a "Demi-God" if you will.

There is no doubt that the word Elohim is a plural word:

• Genesis 1:26 Then the Lord Elohim said, "Let us make man in our image, according to our likeness..."
• Genesis 3:22 Then the Lord Elohim said, "Behold, the man has become like one of us, to know good and evil. And now, lest he put out his hand, and take also of the tree of life, and eat, and live forever."
• Genesis 11:4-8 And they said, "Come let us build ourselves a city, and a tower whose top is in the heavens; let us make a Shem for ourselves lest we be scattered abroad over the face of the whole earth."
• But the Elohim came down to see the city and the tower which the sons of men had built.
• And the Lord Elohim said, "Behold the people are one and they all have one language, and this is what they begin to do; now nothing that they propose to do will be withheld from them.
• Come let us go down and there confuse their language, that they may not understand one another’s speech."
• So the Elohim scattered them abroad from there over the face of all the earth, and they ceased building the city.

As in many other cases, the edited "monotheistic" Bible has compressed into one deity the roles played by one or more other"Gods" who did not always act in accord.